Stealth Tracking of Wireless Users (AT&T, Verizon and Many Others)

Study: 15% Of Wireless Users Now Tracked By Stealth Headers, Or 'Zombie Cookies'

Tech Dirt | August 27, 2015

Earlier this year AT&T and Verizon were caught modifying wireless user traffic to inject unique identifier headers (UIDH). This allowed the carriers to ignore a user's privacy preferences on the browser level and track all online behavior. In Verizon's case, the practice wasn't discovered for two years after implementation, and the carrier only integrated a working opt out mechanism only after another six months of public criticism. Verizon and AT&T of course denied that these headers could be abused by third parties. Shortly thereafter it was illustrated that it was relatively easy for these headers to be abused by third parties. 

Globally, the report notes that AT&T, Bell Canada, Bharti Airtel, Cricket, Telefonica de España, Verizon, Viettel Peru S.a.c., Vodafone NL, and Vodafone Spain are all now using stealth headers.  Source: https://www.techdirt.com/blog/wireless/articles/20150819/08372732005/study-15-wireless-users-now-tracked-stealth-headers-zombie-cookies.shtml

<more at https://www.techdirt.com/blog/wireless/articles/20150819/08372732005/study-15-wireless-users-now-tracked-stealth-headers-zombie-cookies.shtml; related links: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2298638-uidh-report.html (The Rise of Mobile Tracking Headers: How Telcos Around the World Are Threatening Your Privacy. August 2015) and http://amibeingtracked.com/ (Thanks for visiting Amibeingtracked.com. This site was developed by Access Now to allow people to test whether they were being tracked by their mobile carriers.)>